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Costs-budgeting was never a good idea. Drawing-up budgets itself increases costs. Budgets are necessarily inflated to cover contingencies that never occur. Waiting for costs-management hearings, which the judiciary lack resources to hear, causes delay. The profession should press for the abandonment of costs-budgeting and either a return to assessment at the end of the case or - though this would require uncharacteristic courage on the part of rule-makers - inter partes costs fixed as a percentage of damages recovered. Only the latter solution will control costs, which are the bain of our legal system and render justice inaccessible to all but the very rich.